Kanban

If you are a software engineer or run software projects, code coverage is probably very important to you. It’s intuitive. Of course more tests produce better software! It’s easy to calculate. Tools, automation, and stunning charts to impress the people who pay for the occasional pizza are all readily available.
The problem is code coverage is killing you.
Don’t get me wrong. You deserve credit for your agile commitment to quality and your investment in continuous integration and continuous delivery.

I was recently at an event hosted by the Agile Leadership Network of DC (ALN) called Reflective Retrospectives To Build High Performing Teams. It was an interesting presentation with a highly credentialed speaker–Certified Agile Coach, ITIL, PMP/PMI-ACP Coach, Protector of the Realm, Breaker of Chains, and so on–but what really struck me that evening was a question from the audience.
The question came from a fellow software engineer, who began by noting that ALN events typically engage executives and managers rather than engineers, and can be paraphrased this way:

Please take a look at my latest column for Government Computing News where I discuss why Kanban might be an easier agile alternative for government IT projects having trouble with the rigor of Scrum. Just to give you an idea, here is the unedited introduction.
Over the last decade, many have written about what agile software development offers to government IT. Their success has led to a GAO report, for which I was a contributor, on making agile work in the federal government and the U.

Please take a look at my latest column for Government Computing News where I address chronic integration problems in government IT. Just to give you an idea, here is the unedited introduction.
Government decision makers have always had to make do with budgets that fall short of mission demands. Worse yet, the modern political landscape is hardly predisposed to budget increases. The situation is especially difficult for IT decision makers, who are forced to strike a balance between a rapidly evolving technology landscape and the imperative to wring every last drop of value from previous investments.